Cedric Gondouin
Cedric Gondouin is an infamous Breton swordsman. Formerly a distinguished member of the School of the Red Lily, he was disgraced by the order after a series of conflicts with other members led to several unsanctioned deaths at his hand. Following his banishment from the School, he went on to apply his extensive set of skills in all sorts of occupations. He has been known at various times as a sellsword, military auxiliary, assassin, gladiator, and reaver, but most importantly he is known as the captain of a mercenary band known as the Wilted Lilies. Cedric is considered by some to be a Blademaster, his former compatriots from the School of the Red Lily included. He ascribes no value to such a label, though, and rarely if ever introduces himself with that title. Biography Early life Cedric was born into the Gondouin family, a Breton merchant dynasty from Farrun, though he did not live with his family for very long; when he was five years old, his parents and nearlt all his siblings were killed inside their home by cutthroats on the payroll of a rival merchant family. Cedric escaped this fate by happening to have snuck out to nick some sweets from the local bakery. His younger sister also turned out to have survived by locking herself into the pantry. Following the assassination, their only direct family remaining was their uncle, Pierre Gondouin, so custody of the surviving Gondouin children was transferred to him. However, their uncle knew that the family fortune was going to be inherited by Cedric, the only remaining heir. Thus, he disowned Cedric and had him brought to an orphanage in Evermor. Cedric, barely old enough to understand what was happening, could not protest or prevent it from happening, certainly not after the traumatic nature of recent events. For the next six years, the orphanage was Cedric's home. Cedric was a restless and rowdy youth, constantly sneaking out, climbing onto places where he was not supposed to, and getting into fights with the other children. His behaviour wound up with him getting in trouble quite regularly, but incidentally it was that very behaviour that proved to be his way out of the orphanage and into greatness. One day, when he was eleven years old, he attempted to pickpocket a wealthy-looking fellow wearing a red sash in the street. The man noticed his attempt, however, and with lightning reflexes attempted to grab hold of Cedric and apprehend him - but Cedric proved incredibly agile and dextrous, and evaded capture in spite of the man's trained reflexes, fleeing into the crowd and making his way back to the orphanage. Cedric was under the impression that he had shaken off his pursuer, but that turned out to be untrue; the man visited the orphanage later that day. He was not there to arrest or punish Cedric, though. Instead, he revealed himself to be a Scholar of the School of the Red Lily, a highly prestigious order of swordsmen - one of the most elite swordsmanship institutes in all of Tamriel. He added that he was Calvin Moreau, the grandmaster of the School, one of the most skilled Scholars... and Cedric had managed to evade his grasp. Cedric ''should ''have been punished for his pickpocket act, but in light of the outstanding feat of agility he had displayed, Calvin instead offered to take him out of the orphanage and induct him into the School of the Red Lily. Scholar of the Red Lily Cedric soon began his training in the School, along with the other recent recruits. He was a bit of an outsider from the very start, as most of the other newcomers were the children of nobles or other wealthy families, while he was a mere orphan. However, that did not stop him from quickly proving himself as one of the most talented among his peers, besting even older squires by the grace of his agility. By his seventeenth, he was granted his red sash; three years ahead of what the usual procedure would demand, to the dismay of his peers. In light of the School's close ties with the royal house of Evermor, Cedric regularly found himself being lent out to the city watch for important occasions, like many Scholars often were. Cedric had an air of natural charisma about him that soon drew in the camaraderie of the city watch, which was unusual given that the watchmen tended to regard Scholars as aloof (which was not an inaccurate assession). This fact became a point of lampooning for the highborn Scholars, as Cedric thus associated himself with commoners. However, that lampooning soon turned into begrudging respect when he became personally acquainted with the captain of the watch following an incident where Cedric single-handedly prevented a group of dissidents from infiltrating a royal feast and assassinating the captain of the watch and potentially the royal family as well. As Cedric's relations with the city watch strengthened, so too did his position within the School. By his mid-twenties, he was regarded as one of the foremost members of the order. However, he butted heads with various other distinguished Scholars, especially those of particularly highborn status who felt that a commoner such as him had no place in the School, in spite of Cedric's outstanding track record and reputation as a swordsman. One particular opposer of his was a man called Alfonse Malitierre. Alfonse was several years Cedric's senior, a highborn noble and one of the most influential members of the School. Cedric and Alfonse had frequent bouts of throwing insults and derisions at each other, and tensions between them grew increasingly high. Alfonse mostly saw Cedric as a nuisance, an insolent nobody and a pretender, in spite of the fact that it was Grandmaster Moreau who had invited him; Calvin Moreau was an old man by now, his strength slowly but certainly waning. Things eventually came to a head in 5E 123, when, following an incident where Cedric publicly humiliated Alfonse in the presence of Wayrest's royal family, Alfonse sent a number of Scholars under his influence to attack Cedric in his own bed in order to intimidate him. The attack backfired, as Cedric defeated and killed all four of his assailants. Once Cedric learned who had orchestrated it, he promptly sought Alfonse out and duelled him in the middle of the School's main hall. Alfonse was a famous swordsman, a veteran of several wars, but Cedric nonetheless bested him with contemptuous ease - and killed him on the spot. This was in direct conflict with the laws of the School, as killing people inside the School - especially fellow scholars - was strictly off-limits, and was punishable by disgrace and exile from the School, or in some cases, even execution. Not even Calvin Moreau could prevent Cedric from this fate, and as such Cedric was banished. Rogue swordsman Following Cedric's banishment from the School, he was offered employment by the captain of the city watch, working as an auxiliary for the watch, especially during crises. This lasted for a few years, until Evermor got involved in a war with the neighbouring kingdom of Dragonstar. Cedric was asked to serve as a military auxiliary by the watch captain, who had been temporarily promoted to wartime general. Cedric fought fiercely, right up until the final battle of the war. Here, for the first time in his career as a swordsman, he was bested, by a savage Redguard warrior-general known by the Bretons as Jazir the Ogre. Jazir heavily injured Cedric and also killed the watch captain, but was forced to retreat when the cavalry of Evermor and the Scholars of the Red Lily dealt a crushing blow to the forces of Dragonstar. The war was won by Evermor, but things went downhill for Cedric.Category:Characters Category:Males Category:Bretons Category:Blademasters